The present invention relates to an information processing apparatus, method and a program and, more particularly, to an information processing apparatus, method and a program that are adapted to properly recommend content to users.
Several methods have been developed in which television and radio programs or music data stored otherwise are recommended to users.
For example, there is a method in which a matching is provided between user preference information and attribute information of content providable to a user (genre, etc.) to recommend particular pieces of content having attributes that are near the user preference information.
For example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2004-194107 discloses a method in which user preference information is accumulated by use of n-th dimensional vectors according to content attributes and particular pieces of content are determined by use of the accumulated preference information.
Meanwhile, with the above-mentioned method in which matching is provided between user preference information and content attribute information, user preference information is generated on the basis of user's usage log (namely, the attribute information and so on of the content used by a user); normally, however, user preference information is generated on the basis of longer-term usage logs because, as usage logs span, a longer period, the more correctly generated will be user preference information.
In the above-mentioned situation, however, if a user who is in a different mood than usual selects a piece of music that is accordingly different in tune (for example, slow tempo) than usual (for example, quick tempo), this selection (or usage log) of music different from usual is not much reflected onto the user preference information, so that, in a next recommendation, the music of the tune (for example, quick tempo) usually listened to would be recommended as before.